Singapore Press Holdings (SPH)

[Qiaofeng]

thanks Qiao Feng. i am trying to make sense of all the dots.does this mean pop up circulation down in general even factoring the immigrants? sounds bullish if u ask me

Yes, general trend is that Population (popn) up but circulation(cirn) down.
Let's call the above , Method 1 .
It shows for 2009 (latest avail figures), that cirn has dropped 2.8% yoy, altho the popn has risen 1.0% yoy. that is much more than the approx avg 1.0% yoy drop for the 4yrs previous to that.
But is hardly alarming.

Method 2
Latest 2010 households is 1145.9K
Total circulation (all papers incl) for SPH for 2011 is 981.339K.
Penetration rate is 85.6%.
So only 14.3% does not read papers.
Say 3% is due to hardship reasons. Probably only 11.3% does not read printed press but rely soley on internet for info.

My Thots & Observations...
Wanbao and Zaobao and TNP do show quite alarming yoy drops, but the core ST readership looks strong.

The figures are more resilent than I predicted.
It seems to balk the trend in the West.
If SPH circn continues to keep at such a high penetration rate in the next 2 yrs, then the "obsolescence factor" may be less pronounced in Sg; given that new migrants are more affluent and probably needs a local paper to immerse & integrate into local culture.

[Musicwhiz]

Interesting numbers.

My thoughts are - what other serious choice of newspaper do we have? Besides ST, there's BT which is also under SPH. Most other magazines and publications (TODAY, MyPaper) are also under SPH.

Years ago there was a publication called Project Eyeball but it charged 80 cents and therefore did not survive (insufficient demand).

So it does look as though SPH will be around for a long time. But for me, I still think there are other more interesting companies around, haha.

Just my 2-cents personal view.

[karlmarx]

sph is the only print media allowed. even project eyeball was an sph initiative.

sph is an even safer bet than the local banks, and other GLCs. safe yield play.

[mrEngineer]

How does circulation is defined? Hotel customers each room have one newspaper also.

[Qiaofeng]

How does circulation is defined? Hotel customers each room have one newspaper also.

Good Question!!
I took 2011 figures from the Vice Chairman speech.

Despite competition from other media platforms, our print media held
its ground with our total newspaper circulation ending at 981,339 for
FY2011, a slight year-on-year decline of 0.2 per cent.
But there was growth in circulation for several of our papers. The
Straits Times' average daily circulation registered year-on-year
growth of 0.6 per cent to 354,654 copies. The Business Times also
increased by 1.5 per cent vis-à-vis the previous financial year, while
Tamil Murasu continued to enjoy robust growth of 15.3 per cent to
16,747 copies.

It does appear that 981.339K includes alot of other stuff like MyPaper and other free stuff. Very likely your hotel room newspaper is in there too!!
Quite Inflated!!
So if we stick strictly to ST penetration, its 354.654/1145.9 or 31%.
Hmmn, much lower, meaning many households depends on new media (or radio?) , since children nowadays, will likely have school subscriptions for GP and Humanities Classes.

[wsreader]

In the mornings, I can see long queues to collect Today and MyPaper. There are also regulars at libraries and community centres hogging the newspapers. People still get their information from newspapers, just that they do not want to pay for it.
For subscription newspapers, SPH earn from both the advertisers and subscribers. For free sheets, SPH earn from advertisers only. Even though the penetration rate is downtrend, the impact on revenue is lesser. What matters to shareholders are the profit figures.

[Contrarian]

I saw a BUZZ kiosk outside Holland V MRT station. Looks a bit like the 7-11 eleven kiosk concept.

May SPH trying to generate malls and franchise retail outlets as the future revenue drivers

[Contrarian]

I saw a BUZZ kiosk outside Holland V MRT station. Looks a bit like the 7-11 eleven kiosk concept.

May SPH trying to generate malls and franchise retail outlets as the future revenue drivers

[Drizzt]

if circulation of paper reduces yet margins and profits stays probably a good thing

[Qiaofeng]

if circulation of paper reduces yet margins and profits stays probably a good thing

I was quite excited that the V Chairman (VC) revealed the Total Circulation figures and so my initial answer to U was positive.
But when Mr Engineer posed the cirn question, I re-looked the figure of 982K; which when compared with the 355K figure from ST, made me wonder where the balance of 627K came from. I do not think that zaobao, wanbao, BT, TNP, BH and TM equals 627K. Hence, I think the VC figures look inflated with other free papers and float figures added.
The general strategy seems to be to segment the entire market and extend reach by targeting all segments; even students and free sheets.

For ST, the mainstay, the Thur, Fri & Sat editions probably carry the most ads.
The thinking of advertisers in most global cities is to advertise in the No1 & No 2 newspapers ( hence they are the survivors despite the internet in these cities) in cirn becos that present the platform for max reach . In Sg there is no competition, in the broadsheet sector so ST will always be the preferred one.
The introduction of free sheets distributed at MRT points do not seem to affect the broadsheets signifcantly.

However, declining cirn is still a concern.
Say ST cirn drops to 150K, then others formats may evolve to challenge. But, for now, the growing resident popn seem to offset new media effects by keeping ST cirn above the 300K mark; so SPH is not in danger zone of being challenged for the coming years, it seems; in fact, the cirn increased 0.6% yoy for 2011.

What will happen when the resident popn stagnate; due to changes to the migration policy after the GE?

This is the unknown and I hope my prediction of a long term decline turns out wrong.